Search

Begin New Search Content Type Research Paper

21. Kashmir: A Case for Self-Determination

Author:
Hafsa Kanjwal
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
On 5 August 2019, the Indian government unilaterally changed the legal status of the state of Jammu and Kashmir, undermining its own constitutional process and completely annexing a territory that remains disputed in the international arena. In a statement to the Indian parliament, the Indian Home Minister announced the abrogation of Kashmir’s special status enshrined in Article 370 of the Indian constitution, as well as the bifurcation of the state into two Union Territories to be directly governed by the central government. Since then, the government has placed Indian-occupied Kashmir on lockdown. Despite restrictions on the movement of reporters and human rights observers and a clampdown on communication infrastructure (including the internet and some phone services), there have been reports of widespread human rights abuses including extrajudicial detentions (including of minors), torture, sexual violence, and lack of access to basic medical and healthcare services.
Topic:
Post Colonialism, Territorial Disputes, Self Determination, Colonialism, and Empire
Political Geography:
India, East Asia, and Kashmir

22. Toward A Drug-Free Society: The Singapore Approach

Author:
Ng Ser Song
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Illicit drug use exacts a high cost on abusers, their families, and ultimately society as a whole. Livelihoods are lost, relationships are destroyed, children suffer, and the wider community pays a hefty price through a resulting worsened crime situation. Singapore has hence adopted a harm-prevention approach to drugs, incorporating educational, legal, and rehabilitative measures. While we acknowledge that there is a variety of approaches to drug policy globally, our approach has worked well for our local context and enabled people here to live to their fullest potentials.
Topic:
Crime, Health, Law, Criminal Justice, and Drugs
Political Geography:
Singapore and Global Focus

23. Saving Secularism in India

Author:
Mani Shankar Aiyar
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Elected three times to the Lok Sabha, the lower house of the Indian Parliament, and nominated by the President to Rajya Sabha, the upper house, for a further six years, Aiyar has served for 21 years in the Indian Parliament, been conferred the Outstanding Parliamentarian Award (2006), and been a Cabinet Minister for five years (2004-09). He has authored seven books, including Confession of a Secular Fundamentalist, and edited the three volumes of Rajiv Gandhi’s India.
Topic:
Religion, Law, Democracy, Citizenship, Religious Law, and Secularism
Political Geography:
India

24. Kosovo 20 Years On: Implications For International Order

Author:
Edward Newman and Gëzim Visoka
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Kosovo’s small size belies the major impact it has had on the evolving international order: the norms and institutions that shape the behavior and practices of states and other international actors. In three controversial policy areas— humanitarian intervention, international peacebuilding, and international recognition—Kosovo has been the focus of events and debates with far-reaching and globally significant effects. This article will present and discuss these three subjects, and then conclude by considering how Kosovo’s future may continue to be tied to the shifting contours of international order in the context of renewed great power geopolitical rivalry.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, War, Humanitarian Intervention, and Military Intervention
Political Geography:
Kosovo and Yugoslavia

25. The Extraordinary Gamble: How the Yugoslav Tribunal’s Indictment of Slobodan Milošević During the Kosovo War Affected Peace Efforts

Author:
Jacqueline R. McAllister
Publication Date:
01-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
On 24 May 1994, the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY or Yugoslav Tribunal) made history by becoming the first international court to indict a sitting head of state: Yugoslav President Slobodan Milošević. Since Milošević’s rise to power roughly a decade before, forces either directly or indirectly under his control had unleashed a reign of terror first in Croatia, then in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and finally in Kosovo. Indicting Milošević was no small feat: he did everything in his power to cover his tracks. Moreover, in order to secure crucial evidence (e.g., intelligence and satellite imagery linking Serb forces to crime sites) and the support necessary to actually put Milošević on trial, the ICTY required the backing of Western powers, which—until the Kosovo War in 1999—viewed Milošević as a vital, yet unsavory guarantor of peace in the region. Reactions to the indictment were mixed. While the Yugoslav Tribunal’s supporters heralded the indictment as a legal triumph that brought Milošević to his knees, its critics emphasized that, at best, the indictment was irrelevant and, at worst, an extraordinary gamble that had the potential to thwart an end to hostilities.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Conflict Prevention, International Law, Humanitarian Intervention, and Ethnic Cleansing
Political Geography:
Europe, Yugoslavia, and Central Europe

26. Gender Based Violence In The Kosovo War

Author:
Atifete Jahjaga
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Our first question is about the ethnic cleansing that happened during the Kosovo Campaign. It is estimated that 20,000 Albanian men and women experienced sexual violence between 1998 and 2000. Many survivors of sexual violence have been hesitant to speak up, and there were also many mass killings that are only now being discovered. How, in a general sense, did you approach these issues as president given the lack of information, and how has the lack of information made the justice process more difficult?
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, International Law, Humanitarian Intervention, and Ethnic Cleansing
Political Geography:
Kosovo, Yugoslavia, and Armenia

27. How We Succeeded In Kosovo

Author:
Wesley K. Clark
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
The countries of Southeast Europe contain numerous ethnic groups that are united by shared geography but divided by language, history, and culture. These nations are located at the crossroads of Asia and Europe, and, for centuries, were subjected to Turkish invasion, Austro-Hungarian resistance, Russian Pan-Slavism, Venetian culture along the Adriatic coast, and the respective weights of Islam, Roman Catholicism, and the Eastern Orthodox Church. Melding these groups into the state of Yugoslavia at the 1919 Versailles Peace Conference proved only a temporary solution: with the death of Yugloslav President Josip Tito in 1980, the fractionating forces became dominant, and by 1991, Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia, and Bosnia were each struggling to secede or survive against a Serb-dominated Serbia-Montenegro.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Ethnic Conflict, Humanitarian Intervention, and Military Intervention
Political Geography:
Europe, Asia, Kosovo, and Yugoslavia

28. Taking Care Of Business: Industrial Espionage And International Law

Author:
Russell Buchan
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
The essence of espionage is the non-consensual collection of confidential information. Espionage takes different forms depending upon the identity of the perpetrator and the nature of the confidential information targeted. Political espionage describes the state-sponsored theft of confidential information, and its purpose is to shed light on the capabilities and intentions of other state and non- state actors. Economic espionage is also state-sponsored, and it involves states stealing trade secrets from companies located in foreign jurisdictions, usually with the intention of passing this information to domestic companies so that they possess a competitive advantage. In contrast, industrial espionage is perpetrated by non-state actors insofar as it entails companies stealing foreign competitors’ confidential information without the support or assistance of a state.
Topic:
Globalization, International Law, Business, and Espionage
Political Geography:
Global Focus

29. On The Question Of Chinese Espionage

Author:
Nicholas Eftimiades
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Throughout recorded history, nations have employed spies to support foreign policy goals and military operations. However, such clandestine activities seldom become the subject of foreign policy themselves, and intelligence and related activities are rarely subject to public review. Yet in the People’s Republic of China, a massive “whole-of-society” approach to economic espionage is creating a new paradigm for how nations conduct, view, and address intelligence func- tions. In fact, a key element in the United States-China trade war is Washington’s insistence that Beijing cease stealing American intellectual property and trade secrets. China denies the claim, but hundreds of recently prosecuted espionage cases prove otherwise. These espionage activities are changing the global balance of power, impacting U.S. and foreign economies, and providing challenges to domestic and national security, as well as foreign policy formulation. Domesti- cally, they threaten economic security, the protection of critical infrastructure, and intellectual property rights.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Diplomacy, International Cooperation, International Law, and Espionage
Political Geography:
United States and China

30. Spies, Election Meddling, And Disinformation: Past And Present

Author:
Calder Walton
Publication Date:
09-2019
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Brown Journal of World Affairs
Abstract:
Spies, election meddling, disinformation, influence operations, data har- vesting: at present, it seems barely a moment passes without another intelligence scandal breaking on our news feeds. Following Russia’s “sweeping and systematic” attack on the 2016 U.S. presidential election—which was intended to support Moscow’s favored candidate, Donald J. Trump, and undermine his opponent, Hillary Clinton—the media frequently labeled the operation “unprecedented.” The social-media technologies that Russia deployed in its cyber-attack on the United States in 2016 were certainly new, but Russia’s strategy was far from unusual. In fact, the Kremlin has a long history of meddling in U.S. and other Western democratic elections and manufacturing disinformation to discredit and divide the West. Russia’s leader, Vladimir Putin, a former KGB officer, has reconstituted and updated the KGB’s old Cold War playbook for the new digital age. This paper, an exercise of applied history, has two aims: first, to understand the history of Soviet disinformation, and second, to make sense of Western efforts to counter it during the Cold War. Doing so provides policy-relevant conclusions from history about countering disinformation produced by Russia and other authoritarian regimes today.
Topic:
Elections, Cybersecurity, Democracy, Election watch, and Espionage
Political Geography:
Russia, United States, and Soviet Union